Producer Gabrielle Tana presented the film ‘Thirteen Lives’ by the American director Ron Howard to accredited journalists, which is shown at the 51st FEST. The film is based on a true story that happened in Thailand in 2018, when a group of boys together with their coach found themselves trapped in a flooded cave, and as the water level rises minute by minute, the rescue mission becomes very risky and almost impossible.
According to Gabrielle Tana, FEST is very important to her, because she celebrates film and filmmaking and loves coming here. She has been at FEST several times and thinks that ‘it is always wonderful to come back’. Talking to the journalists of FEST, the daughter of producer Dobrivoje Tanasijević - Dan Tana pointed out that her father winning the Belgrade Victor Award at the opening of FEST the night before was a big deal for him.
‘The award came for the films he made in the 70s and 80s in the territory of the former Yugoslavia, and somehow little is known about those films. Now, after 40 years, he received recognition from FEST for his work’, she said. Since the award-winning short film ‘The Tip’ (Bakšiš) by her sister Katerina Tana was also shown at the opening of FEST, the question about film discussions in the Tana family logically arose.
‘When we meet, we try to talk as little as possible about our films. I prefer to talk about the films we saw, which we did not make’, Gabrielle Tana revealed.
‘It is a privilege and an honor to have worked with such a wonderful and kind person as Ron (Howard), who is so open to cooperation, selfless, and we were lucky to have him on this project’, she said.
‘Thirteen Lives’ is produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in association with Bron Creative, Imagine Entertainment, Magnolia Mae and Storyteller S.
‘What happened later was that the company Amazon bought MGM, and our film moved to their platform, which seems to be the future of cinema. Ron Howard is like me’, she said.
Gabrielle Tana recalled when she worked in Serbia on the film ‘The White Crow’ directed by Ralph Fiennes and the moment when she cried at the premiere of the film in Sava Centar in 2018.
‘I was very excited and emotional, because I wanted to shoot a film in my father's hometown, so we worked in Belgrade on a true story about a man who had a similar life path to that of my father’s’, she remembered.
She said that she was currently preparing a film in Serbia, which had always been her wish.
‘The plan is to co-produce a biographical film about Mileva Einstein, and the director of the film is Ashton Walsh.’
Croatian director Dubravka Turić spoke about the Croatian-Lithuanian-Serbian co-production ‘Traces’ (Tragovi), which can be seen in the competition programme at MTS Hall and the Youth Centre of Belgrade, and on the 27th of February at the Belgrade Cultural Centre Movie Theater.
‘FEST is one of the most important festivals in the region and I am glad that we are in the competition programme. Thank you for taking us’, she said. According to the director, ‘Traces’ is an intimate story about what it is like to struggle with change in life, and an anthropological thread is also introduced there.
‘I wanted to touch on the topic of the disappearance of villages, people going to cities. That is our reality.’
She said that it was the first time that Lithuania was involved in cooperation with filmmakers in this region.
‘We can do co-productions only with similar countries. Lithuania turned out to be similar to us’, said Turić and added that the cinematographer from Serbia, Damjan Radovanović, contributed a lot to the film as well.
The director and producer Dino Krpan, Jadranka Soviček Krpan, production designer and co-writer, animator Ana Jelić and actress Anita Matić Delić presented themselves at FEST. They spoke about the animated Croatian film ‚‘The Cricket and Antoinette‘, filmed in 3D animation techniques
‘”The Cricket and Antoinette” (Cvrčak i mravica) is based on Aesop's fable, but with the message that life is not complete without fun, that is, work, work and only work is not enough’, said director and producer Dino Krpan.
The FEST audience was able to see the film today, on the 25th of February, and it will be able to see it tomorrow as well in the Cultural Centre of Belgrade.
